Belfast Actually 2 – serving up chivalry, compromise and stacks of Christmas cheese (Theatre At The Mill until Saturday 3 January)

Walking out of a Christmas show with a smile on your face should almost be the aim of producers. Leesa Harker and Andrea Montgomery are back in Theatre at the Mill with a follow-up to last year’s gem.

Belfast Actually 2 isn’t afraid to acknowledge that not everyone has a perfect life or has two beans to rub together. Right from the start, the bawdy jokes earn hearty laughs from the audience as The Farmer Wants a Wife Christmas Festival gets underway. Montgomery emphasises the tough situations everyone is facing before sprinkling liberal quantities of Christmas cheese over the story.

The first half flies as we get to know the main characters.

Mary (Jo Donnelly) has come to the wife-grabbing contest with a secret agenda. Farmer Jack (Patrick McBrearty) thinks he knows what he’s looking for but meets his match as he progresses through the rounds. In and out of court Lola (Eimear Bailie) is street smart and book smart. Her new probation officer Max (Adam Gillian) recognises huge potential, but Lola doesn’t want to be ‘fixed’ by this ‘melter’ of a man. Established romantic fiction writer Georgina (Emma Little-Lawless) has an overdue book contract, a pushy publisher, a gammy wrist, and no ideas left for the sweltering sex scenes her readers demand. When younger Kimberley (Matthew O’Leary) shows up on the doorstep to help, her idea of what kind of assistance she needs is turned upside down.

Harker knows her audience and makes them giggle with a song about Viagra, a snowy East 17 cover at the interval (mostly for the craic rather than the plot!), and a book reading that had the third row in conniptions.

Lots of secondary characters come and go as the cast of six’s main parts drift towards possible coupledom. The appearance of a puppet influencer is quite left field, but McBrearty’s reprise of older widow Alison from last year’s show proves to be the returning audience members’ favourite. Scenes regularly break into song, with a aptly localised version of Fairytale of New York (The Pogues) impressing along with an 11 o’clock rendition of You’re The One That I Want (Grease).

Adam Gillian’s first act performance of Maria (West Side Story) is electrifying and shows off his tenor voice. (Hoobastank’s The Reason in the second act is too slow and ponderous and threatens to drain energy from the otherwise well-paced storytelling.) His duet with Lola also gives Bailie a chance to shine. (Back in 2019 she memorably played Tony Macaulay’s love interest Sharon Burgess in BYMT’s Paperboy.)

David Craig’s set from 2024 is ‘regifted’ in fresh wrapping paper. Snow falls. A glitterball sparkles. Chivalry isn’t dead. Self-belief is fragile. Some people can find it in themselves to compromise. Lots of local references tickle the audience. By the time the finale arrives, people are shouting out encouragement to the men on stage who may be about to be swept off their feet by strong women.

Belfast Actually 2 runs until Saturday 3 January in the Theatre At The Mill.

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Pinocchio – spectacle triumphs over story in this glitzy pantomime (Grand Opera House until Sunday 11 January)

The Grand Opera House pantomime is certainly a big show in town. Veteran performer May McFettridge is serenaded onto the stage (for the 35th year) with her own song. This year she’s playing the toymaker May Geppetto, creator of the Pinocchio puppet who has turned into a real boy (Adam C Booth). Together with Jiminy Cricket (Paddy Jenkins in his 20th year in a row with May) and the Blue Faerie (Jayme-Lee Zanoncelli), they must help the boy “look for the small voice inside to tell right from wrong” or else face turning back into a puppet.

They’re up against The Great Stromboli (Jolene O’Hara again revelling in the role of the baddie) and her two animal sidekicks – Kitty the Cat (Maeve Byrne) and Phyllis the Fox (Philippa O’Hara) – who plan to kidnap the boy who is economic with the truth and take him to Fantasy Island. (While the script is heavily localised, this watery destination doesn’t cue up any Stephen Nolan jokes, and other shows would have thrown in a Hope Street reference for Jenkins.)

It’s big and brash. Lots of special effects and props are used for a minute or two (sometimes a lot less) and then retired. Pinocchio flies upside down over the heads of the front rows of the audience. A pyrotechnic flash marks every entrance Zanoncelli makes from stage right. There are plenty of fart noises, musical lyric puns, and unfinished risqué sentences.

Although the plot takes a very deliberate jump forward in time over the interval, the story is understood by all to be secondary to the spectacle. A brief cameo by what could pass for the Gallagher brothers is brilliantly staged even though its relevance to the plot is lost in the laughter.

Jenkins’ glittery green outfit shimmers (though sadly his top hat and antennae are too quickly ditched). O’Hara’s Stromboli costume enjoys enormous split shoulders and a whip. Pinocchio’s extending nose could literally put someone’s eye out. The ensemble have taller feathers and so many more of them than NI Opera’s recent Follies.

‘Uncle’ Phil Shute in the orchestra pit with his live band of four pump out an excruciatingly loud soundtrack throughout. Well known songs are rewritten (eg, Achy Breaky Heart). Classics like In The Navy and YMCA are repurposed. A second act rendition of Don’t Stop Me Now is the musical highlight, showcasing the powerful voices of the O’Hara sisters and Byrne.

While the variety act (like Flawless that might have flown in from Britain’s Got Talent) has been dropped in recent years, they’re not really missed. The audience are there for the glamour and the glitz. Booth’s zany comedy and endless energy add sparkle to every scene he’s in. (Though what’s with those pockets in his waistcoat?!)

But as the cast take their bows and head to the wings, it is McFettridge/Linehan who lingers on stage, as if basking in the warmth of the audience to recharge his batteries for the next performance. It’s a brutal schedule with 12 shows a week.

Pinocchio runs at the Grand Opera House until Sunday 11 January.

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Belfast Boy – baring his soul on a bare stage (Kat Woods at Lyric Theatre until 29 November)

Jamie can’t sleep and his London GP would prefer to get to the root cause rather than send his patient out with tablets. Belfast Boy is a confessional piece of theatre that listens in on Jamie’s first session with his ‘head doctor’.

Conor Cupples steps on stage as Jamie, a hesitant figure entering the office and taking the empty seat. When he’s full of stimulants, Jamie can be an extrovert, a night club diva with all the moves. But faced with a psychologist, he’s a nervous individual, at times blurting out almost unfiltered thoughts, and psyching himself up to make what he feels are some of the more major admissions about his coming of age.

His Protestant family grew up in Belfast but were forced out and moved to England. While nothing in his life jumps out to Jamie as being cause for his insomnolence, the audience quickly lose count of the traumatic events and stressful experiences that he has survived.

The set consists of a simple white chair. There are no props. Cupples’ gift of rapidly shifting into and out of different accents is aided by the effective overhead lighting to quickly move in and out of asides and memorable incidents. (His brother Vinto receiving orders from the UVF is accompanied by a neat red, white and blue wash.) Sound effects blast in when phones ring or Jamie plays a video on his phone, but Massive Attack’s Teardrop is one of the few moments when incidental music plays to enhance the mood of a scene rather than being mentioned in the dialogue.

I’ve seen two productions of another (later) Kat Woods play – Wasted (Pintsized Productions and Bruiser) – a two handed show that I described at the time as “a sweaty and sweary examination of consensual sex within the context of a one-night stand and binge drinking culture”. Belfast Boy is no less deftly written, but the pace is deliberately much slower and the overall energy remains more subdued.

Issues of consent are also present in Belfast Boy, along with an exploration of sexuality, assault, sectarian hate, domestic violence and the perils of half inching other people’s property. Cupples brings it all to life with a confident performance that never lets go of Jamie’s diffidence as he processes his life and times.

Previously performed at the Edinburgh Fringe by Declan Perring, the former ‘Belfast Boy’ has to explain concepts from his troubled life back home (like the UVF and The Falls) to a ‘mainland’ practitioner unfamiliar with Norn Iron affairs. By the end of the hour-long session, the layers of protection and memory have begun to be stripped off, and Jamie – along with the audience acting as the psychologist – realise that plenty more remains to be revealed over the next five visits.

Belfast Boy was performed in the Lyric Theatre’s Naughton Studio on 28 and 29 November.

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Pillion – Harry Lighton’s strong directorial debut with a tale of biker bondage (QFT and others from Friday 28 November)

Peggy would like her son to settle down with a nice fella before her cancer catches up with her. So she doesn’t complain when Colin goes out on a date on Christmas night. Probably best she never realises about the festive fellatio out the back of Primark that marks the beginning of her sweet Colin learning about his love of submission over dominance. Soon he’s wearing a padlock and chain around his neck while the sullen and mysterious Ray keeps the key on his own finer necklace.

Screenwriter and director Harry Lighton walks a tightrope of portrayal in Pillion. Colin (Harry Melling) works as a traffic war and performs in a barbershop quartet. He’s made out to be square and boring, although never in a cartoonish manner. But it contributes to making Colin’s willing exploration of BDSM so much more shocking.

Alexander Skarsgård’s Ray is tall, rugged, aggressive and a man of few words. Adopting a domineering attitude towards Colin isn’t an act of roleplay. It’s real, dismissive and reeks of coercive control. (Adam Mars-Jones’ original novel Box Hill is apparently even more troubled at the start of their kink-driven situationship.) Ray stubbornly remains an enigma wrapped in a mystery wrapped in biking leathers.

Ultimately, Pillion becomes dark love story – a ‘dom-com’ according to some reviews – about Colin’s understanding of what brings him pleasure (does he really have “an aptitude for obedience”?), and the audience being forced to decide whether there’s a willing or unwilling power imbalance in this degrading relationship. When Ray finally comes over for Sunday dinner with Colin’s family, Peggy makes it quite clear whose side she’s on!

Lighton’s extraordinary directorial debut finds room for laughter alongside the abuse. Skarsgård and Melling achieve an on-screen intensity that sizzles. Watch out for a memorable prosthetic with a ‘Prince Albert’ piercing. A final rendition of Smile Though Your Heart is Breaking neatly mirrors the tuneful opening scene and helps the audience escape from the bondage back into a less fraught world.

Pillion is being screened in the Queen’s Film Theatre. Amazingly, it’s also playing in Cineworld Belfast and some Omniplex cinemas.

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Jack and the Beanstalk – rags and riches, poverty and privilege, a cow, some beans and a silent chicken (GBL Productions at Waterfront, extended until Sunday 11 January)

Jack is the boy who dares to dream. His widowed mother, Dame Polly Ester, runs a dress ‘shap’. Milkshake the cow zooms across the stage on a scooter, later inviting us all to be part of ‘the Moo Crew’. Jack’s taken with a girl called Jill who might be hiding her privilege. Her dad is also single and looking for love. This year’s Waterfront panto – Jack and the Beanstalk – has rags and riches, a subtle smattering of teenage hormones, a cow that should really be traded for cash, and a beanstalk climbing up towards the heavens.

Into this familiar world strides Swindleworth, with a pot belly and black and white striped trousers. The audience, young and old, know to boo before being told.

Jay Hutchinson gives off a whiff of haughty criminality – “as trustworthy as a Translink timetable” – with his character commanded to steal gold by his boss, the great Giant Causeway. Hutchinson milks every scene and becomes a real audience favourite.

Warren McCook has springs on the soles of his feet as he bounces around the stage like a teenager hooked on Monster. Sé Carr’s Milkshake is relentlessly upbeat. Meabh Quinn’s King Fluster is possessive of his child but mellows to become a warm character on stage.

Johanna Johnston matches McCook’s energy with an endearingly shrill performance as Jack’s coy and giddy best friend forever. They effortlessly duet, with an early sign of their talent their cover of Die With a Smile (“If the world was ending I'd wanna be next to you”).

No Waterfront pantomime would be complete without copious opportunities to run through the auditorium, and a chance for the villain to use a super soaker on the audience.

The cartoonish set matches the brashly coloured costumes. The choreography is boppy. Lighting effects are synced with sound effects and Jack’s dream of being a hero. I’d love to be able to name the creative team, but other than director Chris Robinson, details weren’t provided.

Ciaran Haggerty’s script revels in Hope Street jokes, audience participation, and clever wordplay. While adults in the audience might not recognise where they’ve heard some of the tunes before, anyone of primary school age recognises snatches of KPop Demon Hunters and may even jump up to do the actions unasked.

So far so good. The key ingredients of a great pantomime are all present. Aspects of the production are really well tuned to the target clientele. Yet what comes out of the oven is unevenly cooked.

If opening night (following a few days of previews) is typical, the show is too long, with a half-hearted audience singalong eeking out the runtime even further. Relegated to the end, the competitive singing is normally a filler while the rest of the cast would be off getting changed into their wedding finery (except budgets don’t extend to having new costumes for the final number). This year’s singalong could usefully be ditched.

The inclusion of a wordless chicken Nugget (played by Niamh Canning) who lays unseen golden eggs is a total mystery. It takes a long time before the titular beans arrive and grow into a beanstalk. With a brutal schedule of “three shows a day” as we were too oft reminded, the Dame’s threadbare banter with the audience has a lot of opportunity to mature and improve. More salty comments across more people in the first few rows would definitely help cement the pantomime spirit.

Jack and the Beanstalk is produced by GBL Productions and its run has been extended at the Waterfront Studio until Sunday 11 January.

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Jack Frost – stunning production design brings the ambition of opera to a frozen world of lore (The MAC until Thursday 1 January 2026)

Jack Frost is an ambitious new show that creates a snowy adventure full of peril by weaving together strands of disparate mythology and festive lore with bright music and stunning production design. The MAC’s main Christmas show – one of three that will be running in the building – takes the figure of ‘old man winter’ and injects it with Allison Harding’s rich imagination. Soon the master of cold is joined by friend Neve, an owl (Hoot), a snowman (knowingly named Jon Snow) and eventually St Nicholas to fight back against the dark plans of Cailleach and Krampus.

I’ve been attending and reviewing Christmas shows for a long time, and Jack Frost is almost uniquely difficult to categorise. At this time of the year, many shows aim to leave you with a big warm hug. This one entertains and surprises while keeping the festive cheer to a minimum and shunning schmaltz. The design and musicality are very operatic: no huge surprise given NI Opera’s chief executive is the director, and his hand is all over the sumptuous detailing of the multi-layered costumes and elaborate headpieces. A number of his regular creative collaborators from the opera world contribute to this show.

Niall McKeever’s monochromatic set is a bold gamble that pays off. An intricate miniature village lights up to give a sense that Jack Frost and his friends are sitting outside humanity. White pyramids with sleek lines zoom across the stage on castors. An enormous snow globe – technically some kind of spherical bell – hangs over the stage, doubling up as a screen for interjections by King Alban (Richard Croxford) and Queen Thaloria (Colette Lennon). The chilly look is later warmed up by the appearance of the more colourful Saint Nicholas.

This is a dark tale of menace, anxiety, fatal blows and the chance that the hidden village of Lunareth, and indeed the whole world, is about to change forever. The first ten minutes comprise of a long voice-over followed by a snowball fight while dancing and singing in harmony. Only then do we witness the first conversation and hear the character voices of Jack and Neve. But once they start talking, there’s no stopping them. Parts of the dialogue in the first half wouldn’t be amiss in the form of a soliloquy on stage at The Globe. Turn the snowman into a fellow with a mid-life crisis and the owl into a psychologist, and it could nearly pass for a French baroque tragedy.

After the interval – which gloriously, yet pertaining to little or nothing in the plot, begins with Hoot the owl getting a moment in the spotlight and losing his snark to turn into a strigine version of Shirley Bassey – the pace picks up as the gang of five help Jack Frost quickly work his way through a riddle, a choice and a challenge, and reach the final facedown to save winter from relative disaster. The puppetry extends its ambition from a single owl to include large scale shadow figures.

Jennifer Rooney’s rich choreography is demanding, particularly in some of the musical numbers. Katie Richardson’s brilliant score brings drums to the fore when peril is at its height and throws in sleigh bells for the slightly too cheesy final number. The cast continue singing while taking their bows which seemed to impede last night’s audience from feeling it was time to applaud. The committed cast deserve a longer moment to bask in the gratitude for a job well done.

Allison Harding finds space in her script and lyrics (there’s a great verse that rhymes “chaos” with “delicious”) to take fun jibes at performance art and adult concerns for structural integrity and dignity. But the darkness soon returns with ominous lines: “soon the children will wake screaming in the night”.

As an adult I found myself leaning into the world-building and the unfolding mythology that was very unfamiliar. (If, like me, winter folklore was skipped over in your primary school, Cailleach is a Celtic crone and Krampus is a half goat/half demon from Alpine traditions.) A bit too much concentration required. The occasional video appearances by the Queen and King seemed superfluous.

While the modern cinematic approach of cutting scenes sooner than expected (“arrive late, leave early”) and allowing the audience to fill in the gaps or live with ambiguity doesn’t quite translate to stage, there’s an element of over-explaining that slows down the first act. Jack Frost is a show that’s can’t easily be left to wash over you. Children in the audience seemed to be fascinated by Jonathan M Daley’s dramatic lighting and McKeever’s playful set, and some even sang along with the chorus of the original songs. A lot of younger weans ended up sitting on an adult’s knee, a place of comfort and safety from which to watch this tale of uncertainly unfold. At times this show looks more fun to act in than to watch.

Conor Quinn’s Jack Frost has lots of energy and a good rapport with Eimear Fearon’s Neve who gives off big sister energy coaching Jack through his fears and lack of self-confidence. Together they share a sweet duet in the second act. Darren Franklin once again proves his versatility playing Jon Snow, beginning as an actual snowman with twig arms and fingers, and then as a reformed figure (“no longer made of snow … a fully formed bloke”) who spends much of the first act talking to himself until others take over his existential angst after the interval. (Watch out for the ‘farty’ sound effect when Jon Snow moves.) Mark Dugdale joyously brings to life the puntastic and sardonic owl who feels “bird-ened with responsibility”. Sean Kearns’ St Nicholas is immediately a figure who can be trusted, accessorised with demi-lune glasses, a red cardigan and slippers.

Nine years ago, Rosie Barry was stomping around the MAC stage as Primrose, a sulky teenager with a 3DS (can anyone remember those!), returning the next Christmas as Gretel in a reimagined fairy tale that ended with her closing the show seated at a teary piano. Now she’s back as a baddie, the villainous Cailleach, dressed in dark icy layers and a vicious fringe that would perfect for late night partying on Hill Street. Her expansive vocals rock Richardson’s melodies and turn them into power ballads, blending so well with Jack Watson’s baritone voice (Krampus) giving the two baddies great presence on stage.

Jack Frost is produced by the MAC and continues its run until Thursday 1 January.

Photo credit: Carrie Davenport 

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Lesbian Space Princess // Ulster Says No: The Year of Disorder – Belfast Film Festival #bff25

From the blurb in the Belfast Film Festival programme, it was clear that Thursday evening’s Australian animation Lesbian Space Princess had a lot of creativity behind it: “Straight White Maliens” kidnapping the ex-girlfriend of a royal princess who sets off on a quest to get her back. The concept of “maliens” is genius.

The witty script throws in a lot of clever dialogue, along with universal observations around sexism and reflections on lesbian experience in relationships. White men complain about once being the “most powerful beings in the universe … but we’ve been forgotten”. Their “chick magnet” did not function as intended. Queer love does not run smooth.

Feature debut writers/directors Emma Hough Hobbs and Leela Varghese have deserved utter confidence their material is good enough that it only needs to be said once. (Office Politics, cough.) It’s all very tongue in cheek, so don’t be surprised to find a Royal Pussy living on the “famously hard to find” planet Clitopolis.

Despite being a lesbian whose coming of age has publicly stalled, self doubt-laden Saira (voiced by Shabana Azeez) steps out of her comfort zone to fly off in a Problematic Ship (brought to life with thick sarcasm by Richard Roxburgh) to rescue the much cooler Kiki (Bernie Van Tiel). A former gay-pop idol Willow (Gemma Chua-Tran) lends more than a helping hand.

The animation is psychedelic and contributes to the surreal nature of the film. The stereotypes are well drawn. The original songs (Varghese) are whimsical yet beautiful. Profound commentary is wrapped up in quirky scenes. A tiny penis is (frankly deservedly and comically) harmed in the making of this film.

The small audience in The Avenue Cinema made a lot of noise as we chuckled at the gags. (It was my first visit to the upmarket cinema and I still haven’t got over the table lights staying on, people ordering skinny chips and mushroom pizzas to their seats, and the sound of people chewing throughout the first fifteen minutes of the film.)

When its festival run finally concludes, I’d hope that the riotous and inventive gem Lesbian Space Princess will return to somewhere like the Queen’s Film Theatre sometime next year.

Saturday afternoon saw the screening of Ulster Says No: The Year of Disorder. It’s the product of a partnership between the UTV Archive and Northern Ireland Screen. Director Evan Marshall combed through two years of UTV news reports to craft a 90 minute that charts the build-up and eventual decline of loyalist and unionist protests and unrest in reaction to the London and Dunlin governments signed the Anglo-Irish Agreement.

It’s the mid-1980s and Dennis Taylor was potting snooker balls while Barry McGuigan was knocking out opponents in the boxing ring. The Sinclair C5 was launched to a sceptical public. The two governments hoped that their agreement would foster an atmosphere where peace could grow. The launch wasn’t met with raised eyebrows, but active protest by loyalists and unionists (and rejection by Sinn Féin who saw it as “the formal recognition of the partition of Ireland”).

Strangely I’m more aware of the Falklands conflict in 1982 than this period of local history, despite growing up in a house where Good Morning Ulster was the soundtrack to breakfast. 

We watch politicians warn that violence is inevitable one night, only to condemn the actions of people they distance themselves from the next morning. A picture builds up of political anger that was channelled into mobilising members of the public out onto the streets. Violence broke out at the edges of every mass rally in Belfast. Unionist politicians blame republicans and the NIO’s “dirty tricks department” for incidents of loyalist violence.

We see the owner of SS Moore inspecting the damage to his Chichester Street premises which was looted for golf balls to throw at the police. (The sports store permanently closed this week.)

There is much talk of “quislings” (enemy collaborators), a term which has fallen out of the political lexicon. Fresh faced politicians who are now veterans are seen at every major event: curly haired Jim Wells, Nigel Dodds, Peter and Iris Robinson, Jim Allister, Sammy Wilson, Jeffrey Donaldson with a terrible bowl haircut. But it’s the twin figures of Ian Paisley and Jim Molyneaux who provide the drum beat of the 18 months of fevered protest. Paisley calls the Secretary of State Tom King a “yellow bellied coward”.

The DUP leader opines that “this is a war … this is no garden party or picnic … This could come to hand-to-hand fighting .. we’re on the verge of a civil war in Northern Ireland” would also call for the “organisation” and “mobilisation” of forces opposed to the Agreement. Later, loyalist leaders would say there would be “no violence in this phase of the protest” but warnings were also given that unionists needed to be “prepared to go to violence” if necessary to stand up to the continued implementation of the Agreement.

Alongside the backdrop of ‘ordinary’ attacks and murder in The Troubles, this new set of politically-motivated unionist events are serious – Keith White was shot in the face with a plastic bullet and died in hospital on 14 April 1986 – but aspects of what unfolds is also pretentious and unserious.

Unionist politicians take over the phone switchboard in Parliament Buildings and barricade themselves in, even intercepting a call from a Cabinet minister to a Belfast colleague. From their vantage point outside the building, the camera crew’s microphone picks up the sound of the internal door being broken down.

John McMichael (Ulster Democratic Party and prominent figure in the UDA) swerves reporters’ questions but indirectly makes clear that violence may be the only option. There is talk of “laying down lives rather than surrender”. The 400-strong border village of Clontibret is invaded on 7 August 1986 and “held” for around half an hour. unarmed Gardaí were beaten up.

Peter Robinson was arrested and eventually fined 17,500 punts. Peter Robinson is also seen among those wearing a red beret in an Ulster Resistance parade in Portadown. The end credits note that guns imported by Ulster Resistance were used in many murders and attacks in subsequent years.

While the politicians are most often seen and heard on screen, UTV journalist Ivan Little’s reporting stands out. His rhetorical flourishes provide a lot of colour and prick the pomposity of some incidents. The hanging of mayoral chains on a barbed wire fence erected at Stormont Castle signifying the “death of democracy” was “somewhat undermined when [they were] retrieved 15 minutes later”.

The footage from the time was captured in a standard definition 4:3 aspect ratio. Stylistically, it’s unfortunate that the captions sometimes ignore those boundaries and extend into the black bars at the side.

Editor Paul McClintock does a fine job in cutting down reports to pick out the most salient points. While journalism is only ever “the first rough draft of history”, these clips from the UTV archive paint a picture of the mood and depth of feeling in late 1985 and throughout 1986. School history and politics teachers will be keen to get access to the snappy reprise of this important period.

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Marjorie’s Dead – mixing laughs and legend in this tale of a woman who lived once, buried twice (Dark Forest Theatre at Grand Opera House until Saturday 8 November)

Marjorie McCall’s husband is the local doctor. John wasn’t able to properly diagnose or cure the sudden illness that cut her young life short. The undertakers don’t quite finish the job, leaving the coffin above ground and covered in an eighteenth-century tarpaulin. They’ll come back later after a few scoops at the local hostelry. In the meantime, graverobbers fancy their chances selling her wedding ring.

Starting at the wake house – quite a familiar device in Belfast theatre! – the fourth wall-breaking Marjorie’s Dead soon unravels the backstory of how this woman ended up with an overbearing husband who didn’t share her vision of an island steeped in folklore and wonder. She believes in spirits, rejoices in the beautifully rich landscapes, marvels at legends. Yet she’s about to become a legend herself: the Lurgan woman who was buried twice.

Dark Forest Theatre love lifting the lid on family secrets.Nathan Martin’s take on the premature burial of Marjorie McCall weaves her story around that of Oisín and Tir na nÓg. Through her astute brother Cian (played by Martin) we hear how Marjorie came to be lying in a rural forest burial plot. Through her logical and disrespectful husband John (Tiarnán McCarron) we understand how she became trapped in a marriage with a monster.

Thursday’s matinee audience did a good job of picking up the social commentary and there was much tutting and sharp intakes of breath in moments when John took decisions on behalf of Marjorie (like deciding to marry her, his proposal lacking a question mark) and when he revealed the chillier side to his character. And there were laughs when truth was spoken:

“Be careful Mr McCall, you’re speaking to a Lurgan woman!”

The nature of this three-handed play requires Annina Noelle Watton to deliver a series of lengthy monologues, alone with just a couple of beautiful trees and some stumps to work with. While there’s a lot of material to get through, and there’s a lot of attention taken to creating and preserving the sense of atmosphere, parts of the delivery would benefit from being less rushed and given more space to breathe. Marjorie interprets her life against the unfolding tale of Oisín (differentiated from the main action by being performed stage right) which gives depth to the thin details known about the circumstances of her life and deaths.

Marjorie’s Dead mixes laughs and legend. McCarron and Martin (who also directs) make a good comedy double act. Watton is solid as the titular character, although there would be room to ramp up the more bohemian side to the character to emphasise her otherworldly nature. The short run in the Grand Opera House studio space sold well and finishes this evening. Dark Forest Theatre continues to demonstrate its talent in relating tales of the unexpected.

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Underscore // Housejackers – two feature films enhanced by Phil Kieran’s scores – Belfast Film Festival #bff25

Two very different films celebrated their world premieres at Belfast’s Odeon Cinema last night as part of Belfast Film Festival. One thing linked them: banging soundtracks from Phil Kieran.

Underscore is a genre busting feature, an experimental film, part poem, part guided meditation, and part cautionary tale about the state of the Earth. Real and special effects landscapes and creatures are fused together. It’s ages before the back of a man appears on screen, and local audiences will immediately recognise Granda Joe Granda Aodhán (Ian McElhinney) from any angle.

One of the film’s concepts will be familiar to fans of Star Trek: Discovery with its ‘spore drive’ taking advantage of the ‘mycelial network’. In Underscore, Laoise (Jessica Reynolds) must educate her grandfather about the mushroom network that allows fungi talk to each other. The film is a cry for people to better connect themselves with the Earth before it’s too late.

Shots jump from macro to micro. What feel like a solid animated structures morph into other forms and then back again. It’s like weaving through a three-dimensional fractal. One of the most sophisticated scenes comes in the shape of feathery fish. The biggest wow moment comes when the fish dissolve into a pastoral scene shot from above. By that stage of the film, the trancelike music and visuals have worked their magic and you barely notice the transition until it’s happened.

Reading that last paragraph without having seen the film may make it sound like a cinema full of people willing took a particularly vivid trip courtesy of some magic mushrooms. No mushrooms were harmed in the viewing of the film. But coming just a couple of hours after attending a heartbreaking funeral, attending the screening of Underscore did prove to be a calming and therapeutic intervention.

It will be interesting to see where Underscore goes. It would be perfect to watch wearing a virtual reality headset, although you need the big bass subs and surround sound of a proper cinema to do Kieran’s music justice and become absorbed in the mood. It might also work projected onto a curved screen that you could walk into the middle of and become consumed by Glenn Marshall’s visuals and the soundtrack. Watch this space to see how Hugh McGrory’s masterpiece develops.

The second premiere had to be switched to a larger screen to accommodate the strong interest. Housejackers watches the chaos wreaked on a student flat as Jerdy invites himself to stay with his foster brother.

While the flat is populated with some predictable stereotypes, the characters are (mostly) sympathetically written. Shauna is ditzy and has her own line in ukelele electronic music (played by Saorlaoith Brady). Raymond (Finnian Garbutt) works in the local filling station shop and is secretly studying for his GCSE Maths exam. Lucy (Eubha Akilade) is a hard-working and kind-hearted medical student who mostly has Raymond’s back. Bobby (Ryan Dylan) is the unlikeable posh fun-sponge who looks down his nose at Raymond’s less refined background.

Actor John Travers regularly wows audiences on the stage with his brash delivery of one-person theatre shows that are full of energy. He’s perfectly cast as Jerdy, the driving force of the film. Jerdy could start a party in an empty room. But one glare could also kill the mood at any celebration. He’s a tad younger than Raymond, but the pair were fostered around the same time by ‘Nan’. They’re good company for each other but might potentially lead each other astray. They may not be blood relatives, but in the past they were as close as brothers in criminal escapades for which Jerdy served time but Raymond escaped and took full advantage of his second chance. Now Jerdy is back and is winding Raymond back into his destructive orbit.

The cast turn in performances that match the intensity of the story arc. Director Rian Lennon and screenwriters David Kline and Brian McGleenon gently demonstrate Raymond’s insecurities to the audience in contrast to Jerdy’s extreme heart-on-sleeve unfiltered personality that bursts into all his scenes. The filling station is the location most steeped in humour, yet also the venue for the most brutal violence.

Housejackers certainly provoked lots of conversations on the way out of the screening. The wider fostering network may well recognise the pressures Nan is under and the issues she raises. Raymond’s innumeracy is very credible. The film doesn’t judge and never makes fun of Gerdy and Raymond’s circumstances. But is the depiction of looked after children in foster care growing up to lead a life of crime accurate even at one end of the spectrum? Those behaviours definitely exist across society, whether living with birth parents or not.

Confidently directed and beautifully filmed and edited, Housejackers is a quality product. Its future journey through distribution, release and marketing will be interesting to follow. My bet is that it’s more suited to a streaming platform than the cinema given its lack of mainstream appeal. Time will tell.

Two very different films that show off the talent and creativity of Northern Ireland cast and crew. And still three days to go in this year’s Belfast Film Festival.

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Office Politics // Fior Di Latte – an evening of men behaving badly – Belfast Film Festival #bff25

Tuesday evening at Belfast Film Festival featured a duet of movies all about men behaving badly.

North coast tragi-sex-comedy-part-horror Office Politics was screened in the Belfast Odeon cinema and examines the behaviour of three men who staff a tax return advisory company. Self-obsessed Lawrence (played by Neill Virtue) is ill-mannered towards his exasperated pregnant wife (Jenny Marshall), perennially turns up late, and tells appallingly off-colour jokes. David (Gary McElkerney) is obsessed with getting his long-suffering partner (Joanne O’Neill) to “talk dirty” to him. George (Michael Killen) is quickly described on-screen as a “Walter Mitty” character who claims to have fought in Vietnam (despite being the youngest of the three misogynistic degenerates), takes everything very literally, shows signs of having OCD, and struggles to find the right words to say to the feisty waitress in the local restaurant (Christine Clark) who has the hots for him. All three have a torrid fascination with – though little experience of – anal sex.

The trio leave a wake of disruption and disrespect behind them like an HR cluster bomb. To emphasise his absolute lack of common decency, Lawrence bullies George – eating his cookies and snaffling his milk – while David tries to feed advice to improve his younger colleague’s faltering love life. They’re the kind of men who never grew up and race to the window each morning to see a woman in yoga pants walk by, and refer to a woman with many children potentially from different fathers as “machine gun fanny”.

Aside from the office workers, the director and screenwriter Neill Virtue (who also plays Lawrence) throws a few more ne’er-do-wells into the fray, including one ignoramus who calls the waitress “sugar tits” and rightly gets clobbered around the head. The comedy makes little attempt to be sophisticated. An early dance sequence promises a sense of the surreal that isn’t particularly followed through. The element of horror is entirely down to the recurring actions of George which I won’t spoil. The skillful editing, bouncing between parallel locations and storylines, along with Richard Brown’s playful score lift a number of scenes and provide colour in the midst of simple sets.  

Does Northern Ireland need – or deserve – a sex-mad comedy with puerile humour? I’m not sure, but it’s certainly got one. Despite my misgivings, it certainly compares well to The Unholylands which has been screened daily for weeks in Omniplex and Movie House cinemas. Office Politics is a real labour of love, with a short (probably a better format to contain the three coworkers’ mannerisms) produced before Covid and the feature version finally making it to the big screen in 2025. 

While the men are beyond redemption, the objectified women largely grow in confidence, learn to stand up for themselves, and – by the film’s half way point – begin to take back control and emasculate their doltish partners. A final scene is stolen by a grinning pre-schooler in an attempt to give the film a happy ending. Burying the three office workers up to their heads in the sandy beach at high tide might have been a more fitting conclusion and would have cemented the horror vibe.

A fifteen minute race across the city got me over to see Charlotte Ercoli’s feature debut Fior Di Latte being screened in the Queen’s Film Theatre. When struggling playwright Mark (Tim Heidecker) loses the inspiring scent of his comfort blanket (a pair of boxer shorts over which perfume was spilt in his suitcase on a trip to Florence, Italy), he desperately tries to recreate the smell and sense of being valued from the holiday. This is complicated by the presence of Francesca (Marta Pozzan), now lodging in his cluttered New York apartment and the subject of his obsession.

A collector of mostly faux (and sometimes unpleasant) cinema memorabilia, Mark’s ability to relate to women is almost as deeply flawed as his ability to live up to his job as a writer. A looming deadline to produce a draft script leaves him in a panic and his writing method is shown to be all madness, The loss of his prized rag sends him on a mission across the city to find precious ingredients for a master perfumer (Kevin Kline) to recreate his preferred scent.

A strong whiff of the aroma triggers hallucinogenic flashbacks to moments when Francesca has been kind or praised Mark. Her on/off attraction towards rude and thankless Mark is troubling, and feels like a type of Stockholm Syndrome. His utterance of “take me as I am or you scram” could equally have been said by some of the men in Office Politics. 

Ercoli has a much larger budget than Virtue, and the attention to detail in her sets gives the scenes a lot of depth that is understandably missing in the north coast movie. Cinematographer Thimios Bakatakis liberal use of wide-angle lenses gives an other-worldly feel to some scenes. The perfumer’s Heath Robinson machine to blend his ingredients adds to the sense of whimsy along with Andy Street’s score. On two occasions – far too few – characters burst into song … reminding viewers that Mark claims to be a lyricist as well as a writer.

Whereas Office Politics’ menfolk are totally objectionable, Ercoli’s Mark is allowed to veer between pathetic and creepy, written quite sympathetically as a man in the middle of a long breakdown. It’s a stronger approach and plays to Heidecker’s considerable comic talent, leaving Fior Di Latte’s audience wondering whether Mark could salvage a decent personality and a career from the mess he has created.

Belfast Film Festival continues until Saturday 8 November.

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Lucky Lu – a man reliant on the gig economy comes close to losing everything – Belfast Film Festival #bff25

Less than a month ago, Queen’s Film Theatre screened the superb Souleymane’s Story about a Guinean refugee who works as a food delivery rider in Paris while waiting for the outcome of his protracted asylum claim. Director Boris Lojkine’s tale (cowritten with Delphine Agut) is one of being taken advantage of at every corner, and ends up focussing on the structural problems with the French asylum process and how that drives migrants into a shadow economy where profiles on delivery apps are rented and more than half the takings are withheld. Parts of the lead actor’s own experience of coming to France were written into the script and the success of the film seems linked to Abou Sangaré being invited by the French government to apply – his fourth time of trying – for residency.

Lloyd Lee Choi’s feature debut Lucky Lu covers a lot of similar territory. This time, Lu Jia Cheng has a visa to work in the US. But his original restaurant business failed and he’s been forced to work as a delivery rider to raise the funds to rent an apartment that will allow his wife and daughter to fly from Asia to join him in New York.

Over two days we witness his entire livelihood collapsing like a takeaway falling through the bottom of a thin plastic bag and the food spreading over the pavement, unable to be recovered into something edible. Lu falls onto a catastrophe curve that only goes one direction. While his family are in mid-air, his e-bike is stolen in the first of a series of losses. No bike means no rented profile on the delivery company’s app, no bike deposit, no income stream, no deposit and rent for the new flat, and soon his physical health is joining his poor mental wellbeing in the gutter. Lu’s life seems to have gone beyond a point of no return into a wasteland beyond precarious.

Chang Chen portrays an utterly broken man who doesn’t know how he’ll get through to the end of the day, never mind find a way of surviving the next. He veers between desolation and depression, with a gaunt face reflecting his undereating. “I’ll pay you back soon – I give you my word” won’t pay an apartment deposit in the morning. People let him down, yet he carries the deep shame of having let other people down in the past.

Less than a day after the film begins, his young daughter Yaya (Carabelle Manna Wei) arrives in New York and the film pivots to experience America through her eyes. Out of the mouth of babes comes many home truths. Her finely tuned emotional intelligence senses that father Lu is not well. The pair spend a full day together, tearing across the city almost heroically trying to raise funds that will surely never meet his immediate needs.

The people Lu meets fall into two categories: those who are tough but end up showing him limited amounts of kindness, and those who are just out to rip him off. Sometimes it’s hard to determine which category characters will fall into. And the challenge to Lu is which camp he will fall into as he discovers the easiest way to make money is by stealing bikes and inflicting pain on other people for his own meagre reward. At one point little Yaya offers a way of making some easy cash and it challenges Lu to consider whether to drag her into his dangerous pursuits.

A glimmer of hope – a physical ray of light – is proffered at the film’s conclusion. But it seems like a false promise. Crawling out of one hole will only lead to landing in another pothole a day or two later. Can the presence of his wife and the restoring love of his daughter materially change the family’s luck?

Lucky Lu is an incredible first feature written and directed by Lloyd Lee Choi. It combines well rounded characterisation with some superb acting to go beyond documenting the gig economy’s exploitation of overseas workers to explore to what lengths people under pressure will go to survive.

Another great screening as part of Belfast Film Festival which continues until Saturday 8 November.

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It Was Just An Accident // The Secret Agent // A Private Life – Belfast Film Festival #bff25

Over eight hours on Sunday afternoon and evening, the Belfast Film Festival whisked me away to authoritarian regimes in Iran (contemporary) and Brazil (1977), and a psychanalyst failing as an amateur detective in France.

It Was Just An Accident begins with a family on a late-night car journey who ‘meet’ a dog on the dark road. The driver has a distinctive limp, and he’s recognised while asking for help for his broken down car. Before long, there’s a drugged body in the back of a van, along with a bride, her groom, her wedding photographer, another local man, and a shovel.

A group of Iranian dissidents think that they have stumbled upon the man they nicknamed ‘Peg Leg’ who tortured them. His identity takes time to prove. His fate takes even longer to decide.

Part road trip movie, part exploration of the merits of justice and revenge, It Was Just An Accident is often droll, sometimes farcical, at times emotionally wrought, but always measured. In the face of death, there’s also room for new life, a modicum of compassion, and a bribetastic mentality. The drawn-out plot together with the group’s diffidence reflect the moral struggle of sinking to the level of a torturer or retaining the upper hand without getting a satisfactory result.

Iranian director Jafar Panahi has been imprisoned multiple times and was banned from making films. He continues to work as a guerilla moviemaker, without permission and using small casts and minimal crew. His take on a society that lives in fear of state authorities is brave and informed. Even without this backstory, It Was Just An Accident is a classy piece of screenwriting, cinematography and filmmaking.

The Secret Agent heads back to the late 1970s and the Brazilian military dictatorship. Former teacher Armando (known by the alias Marcelo for much of the film) is on the run as a political refugee. He takes shelter in an apartment block run by a 77-year-old landlord in the city of Recife. But the safe house doesn’t provide all the protection he needs when a contract is taken out on him and comes under an active threat.

Cut into this sepia tale of living under threat are occasional scenes with modern-day researchers listening to old interviews from the resistance network who are able to piece together Armando’s fate. Watch out for the conjoined cats, and a missing leg which performs some neat karate moves (a distraction story planted in the media rather than the film swerving into magic realism).

While the grindhouse style is a strength, The Secret Agent’s unhurried (ie, monstrous) runtime (over two and a half hours) isn’t quite justified by the on-screen storytelling. Yet Kleber Mendonça Filho’s film still manages to be a vivid insight into a terrible period of Brazil’s history.

Sandwiched between these two stories of corruption and violence was A Private Life. Jodie Foster plays Lilian, an American psychoanalyst in Paris. Not all her clients are happy. One wants a refund for a decade or more of therapy after a simple trip to a cheap hypnotist helped him quit smoking the same day. Another client is dead, presumed to have taken her life. But Lilian wonders if there’s a darker reason for her death. Together with her optometrist ex-husband Gabriel (Daniel Auteuil), she delves into her dead client’s husband’s life and affairs.

As a fan of the MiniDisc format, it’s of particularly note that Lilian archives her client interviews using portable MiniDisc recorders. While Sony stopped selling MD devices in 2013, they only ceased production of blank MiniDiscs in January this year.

A Private Life feels like a rare opportunity to see Foster playing a comedy role, and only her third French-language film. The amateur sleuths aren’t afraid of bin-hoking or larceny. They get embroiled in plenty of false leads. But Lilian and Gabriel’s bonhomie and overthinking approach means that this 103-minute-long film could cheerfully have been extended.

A great Sunday at Belfast Film Festival which runs until Saturday 8 November.

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Faust-ish – is a deal with the devil the only way out of this politician’s #CashForMash scandal? (Big Telly Theatre Company in Lyric Theatre as part of Belfast International Arts Festival until Sunday 9 November) #BIAF25

The 2025 Belfast International Arts Festival programme has included some brilliant theatre productions, but they may have saved the best until last. Big Telly’s Faust-ish is a fresh, contemporary and invigorating production with a consistent aesthetic that extends across the script, the acting, the movement, the set, the lights, the sound, and every aspect of the show.

The gathering audience find themselves witnessing a hastily convened press conference with the local Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Farming who quite categorically states “I will not resign” despite the police investigation into the ‘Cash For Mash’ scandal. (Current criticisms of several Executive Ministers and calls for votes of no confidence strongly resonate, although there are no financial allegations in these real-world challenges.)

We next join the now former minister Faith Hughes in Black Arch Cave where she’s knocking back miniature bottles of solace, pouring out a circle of salt, and chanting an incantation in a bid to summon the devil and do a deal to restore her reputation and regain power. Not quite the ‘meaningful change’ she has been campaigning for, but she’ll do just anything that’s asked of her if it’ll resurrect her career. The problem for Faith is that she may not have much of a soul to sell. (Classically, Faust makes a deal with the devil, exchanging his soul for unlimited knowledge and worldly pleasures.)

Dressed in a red power suit, Jo Donnelly portrays a ferocious political operator whose personal relationships are tertiary to her concerns to exercise power and cling onto it. (Donnelly previously appeared as resigned Prime Minister Theresa May in Rosemary Jenkinson’s 2019 Mayday! tragi-comedy.) Even when her chips are down – or about to be toasted in the fires of hell – Faith still works every angle to exploit matters for her advantage. Double down and never quit seems to be her mantra.

To help Faith understand who she is dealing with, Lucifer (a masterful Chris Robinson) takes the shape of her ultimate nemesis ... a senior civil servant accompanied by his resourceful junior underlings. But will he play by the rules when up against such a fierce negotiator as the cancelled politician?

Big Telly enjoys turning theatre on its head. In the Lyric’s studio venue, curtains rise up from the floor to help create the set. The tech desk sits to stage right while some props and live sound effects spring from stage left. The devils’ costumes are beige (with Lucifer getting neat pockets on the outside of his trousers), part of the production’s stripped back canvass onto which an examination of power is projected. Much of the lighting (Sarah Jane Shiels) is handheld, creating novel and evocative shadow effects.

Emma Rose Creaner slips on a red jacket to become Wendy, personal assistant to Faith, morphing into an uber-ambitious colleague who slowly amps up her megalomaniacal tendencies as she navigates the opportunity caused by Faith’s fall from grace. Creaner also portrays Faith’s daughter Aoife who has been sidelined as a terrible inconvenience and embarrassment by her mother and is bullied at school (as one nearby audience members knew from personal experience).

Claire Lamont completes the strong cast of daemons, and plays adolescent Faith’s guardian and ‘The Way’, a character who holds Lucifer to account. Sashaying her way across the stage, Lamont exudes joy and delight in many of the moments of beautiful movement which feel very natural and unforced that have been created by director Zoe Seaton and choreographer Sarah Johnston. The miming of typing is both fun and frenzied. An argument physically moves across the stage from side to side as we watch the two protagonists try to turn the table on each other.

Nicola McCartney’s deeply satirical script takes the view that the public don’t – or no longer – expect high standards of those serving in public office. It’s full of political lingo and a riot of ideas and analysis of how power corrupts. By the time we reach the final quarter of the 70-minute show, it feels like the shark has almost been jumped when a Mars-bound tech CEO Ella Tusk appears (although the gag about “interplanetary salad bars” is almost worth it).

Politicians are easy targets for cynical playwrights. Yet politicians are a focal point for how we scrutinise society and how the state impacts our lives. They demand and deserve considerable media attention, and can sway everyday debate and sentiment on subjects many of wouldn’t have realised we needed a strong opinion on. And politicians – a proportion of them – have a record of not always behaving with the integrity the role warrants (even if public expectations have been dampened).

But McCartney’s script does hint that politicians aren’t the only people who might sell their soul to the devil. And the scenes between Faith and her daughter Aoife are some of the most poignant moments in the play as nature faces nurture and Faith must decide whether she has passed on her experience of being abandoned by her mother to the next generation. That’s quite universal amid the throwing of shade towards elected representatives!

The atmosphere created by the lights and set are augmented by Garth McConaghie’s soundscape which runs throughout almost all of the performance (the few moments when it’s silent really stand out) with musical themes that accent Faith’s behaviour and struggles as well as reverb effects that emphasise when the action has returned to the cave.

Monologues, arguments, flashbacks, a song and dance number: Faust-ish throws a lot of different elements into the mixing bowl and together they create a very tasty performance. There are puns aplenty, both verbal and musical.

Faust-ish is technically ambitious. It’s quite mad. Yet even in its most outlandish and unexpected moments, you still get drawn into the scenes through the quality of the different creative elements working together in perfect harmony.

Race to get a ticket for Faust-ish. It runs in the Lyric Theatre until Sunday 9 November as part of Belfast International Arts Festival. And don’t forget to bring a torch.

Photo credit: Neil Harrison Photography 

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The Musicians of Bremen Live! – a riot of colour and music as four animals learn to work together (Cahoots NI and Segerstrom Center for the Arts as part of Belfast International Arts Festival) #BIAF25

Attending a performance of The Musicians of Bremen Live! feels like being part a live-action version of a much-loved children’s book. A hen, a mule, a coyote and a bobcat find themselves thrown into a mission to return some lost musical instruments to the big city in the west coast of the US. Along the way, there are human, animal and topological dangers to avoid, and plenty of strains and stresses amongst the diverse group of characters.

Charles Way’s take on the Brothers Grimm’s fairy tale ably adapts the original plot points and refines the sense that the diverse troupe of animals have to first become comfortable listening to themselves and then to each other before they can act in harmony to live out their shared ambitions.

The colourful quartet features Ruffles the effervescent glass-half-full ideas-factory hen (“she’s for singin’ not for eatin’”) played by Philippa O’Hara. Christina Nelson brings to life the old curmudgeonly mule who isn’t afraid to get on her high horse and wiggle her ass and who is unfailingly taken for granted while having fought hard for her freedom. Making their entrance through the audience are the chaps-wearing howling coyote (Kellee Broadway) and a bobcat who never wants to be kept in the shade (Pepa Duarte).

Narrating the tale and providing the live soundtrack are Chubby Jones and Dizzy Dexter (aka composers Kyron Bourke and Padraig Dooney). The musical styles almost cross genres mid-song with moments of jazz, gospel, honky-tonk, musical theatre, blues and pop. If you’re not tapping your foot by the time I’ve Got a Friend in the North comes round, you’ll have succumbed during the starry rendition of There’s Water on the Other Side and the later Hold Onto Each Other.

Diana Ennis has gone to town with the costumes, with feathery accessories for Ruffles the hen and deep pannier bags for the mule. An upright piano is the only permanent prop on the circular stage (which also supports Cahoot’s other festival show Unlocking Sherlock). Simon Bond’s lighting effects help involve the audience by extending the atmosphere into the tiered seating in the shopping centre venue.

At times there’s so much going on with four animals bickering – or “gnarlin’” as the straight-talkin’ mule might say – along with the narrators’ vocals that the storytelling is lost in the melee. The abandonment of the pledge to return the instruments is skipped over in a heartbeat, but that’s easily forgiven when the band reach their destination.

Towards the end of the hour-long show, there’s a gorgeous ballad City That Gleams featuring Ruffles. O’Hara’s soaring vocal quality is reminiscent of Whitney Houston with a much higher range. Broadway riffs off the catchy melodies as the foursome morph from four individual animal crooners to a close harmony group. Before long – spoiler alert – we enter the psychedelic Wibble Wobble Club for a closing medley with a riot of colour and musical styles. Watch out for the hip hop-tastic mule who no longer seems so long in the tooth!

Questions of valuing the other and playing to your strengths while learning to look out for each other’s needs are universal. Conquering fears and sharing the load are much-needed traits in the US, the UK and beyond. There’s a lot packed into the show, and while the youngest audience members (suitable got ages 5+) may be transfixed by the colour, sounds and animal characterisations, the older members of Saturday afternoon’s audience were in kinks at some of the dialogue.

The Musicians of Bremen Live! was created and produced by Cahoots NI and Segerstrom Center for the Arts. It’s Northern Ireland premier is part of Belfast International Arts Festival. The short (sold out) run finished on Sunday 2 November in Cityside Retail Park.

Photo credit: Melissa Gordon/Gorgeous Photography (from the original US run of the production) 

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